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Wednesday, September 22, 2004

Happy New Year !!!

My Family and I are trying to celebrate the Biblical Holidays. We figure - if it was good enough for Jesus! We are having a lot of fun and learning a lot about Jesus, ourselves and the Jewish culture from which Jesus and Christianity came. We celebrated tonight and last night Rosh Hashanah (the Jewish New Year which honors God as our King and His creating the Earth) - I know - six days late. Oops! It snuck up on me without me realizing it - darn those roman calendars we use and their small print - better late than never! Hey, this is new to me. Well anyways, we had a fancy dinner with all the fancy glassware and silverware; candles; a purple satin tablecloth (symbolizing God's royalty); a feast (symbolizing His Kingly provision) and we read from the Bible and talked about Jesus and life stuff. It was a blast!! It was a family activity. A family tradition. Just to let you know:These are holidays that were celebrated by the early church, until Emperor Constantine made Christianity the official religion of Rome. He then took originally pagan holidays and Christianized them so pagans would accept the Romanized version of Christianity. Then he eradicated any trace of the Jewish roots from Christianity using the old ' the Jews killed Jesus' propaganda. He in essence, robbed the church of beautiful festivals, most of which were ordained by God and all of which show that Jesus the Messiah would come. These festivals also teach us much about the character and person of Messiah Jesus or Yeshua. Well anyways, we (the Church) persevered and gave real meaning to the new (formerly pagan) celebrations of Christmas, Easter, etc. But, it is also really cool to study and try - I say try - to learn and follow the festivals of the Jews and the early Church. I think many see them and practice them as a burden. What a drag they are if you are legalistic about observing them and see it as a religious duty or don't understand their meaning. Some might 'say I hate tradition! Yuck!' Or ' traditions made by man are bad.'These statements could be true, but not necessarily if you understand the meaning, you teach the meaning and you're not legalistic about these traditions. If this criteria is met, then they are fine, even if created by man (as long as they are acted out of a true heart and were created to honor God). Some object to the celebrating the formerly pagan holidays (Christmas, Easter, Ect.) - but I disagree with that if the one celebrating the holiday is honoring God with his heart.I would sugest trying it out. We have a book called "A Family Guide to the Biblical Holidays" that we are using! If you are curious about this or want to try it out go to this site:http://biblicalholidays.comEnjoy.If you think this is cool or I'm stupid or nuts email me at:christslave@comcast.netKirby